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1 Billion Reasons to Love GuideStar

What is GuideStar’s Impact?

How does GuideStar talk about itself? Depending on the audience, we talk about our mission (transparency and better decision-making), web traffic (10 million visitors annually), our specialty (IRS Form 990s), or our size ($10 million), among many other operational measures. But we don’t typically talk about our impact.

And frankly, we never had a good tool to quantify our impact.

Courtesy of Habitot Museum

The Survey

Over the last two months we conducted a simple one-question survey to start answering this complicated question. Respondents were asked to complete this sentence, “In the last year, GuideStar helped me or my organization to ….”

The Findings

Using responses to date, we found that GuideStar has helped other nonprofits:

Move more than $1 billion of funding through the nonprofit sector

Save the lives of 1,000 youth in Kenya

Feed more than 18 million meals to the disadvantaged

Teach more than 300,000 kids in various programs

Improve 52,373 units of housing for low-income people in New York

Make healthcare available to 60,000 disadvantaged people in southwest Uganda

These are just samples of the answers that we received. Our true impact is considerably higher since these were culled from only 900 responses, a tiny fraction of our thousands of customers, 10 million site visits, and myriad partners.

Won’t you contribute to GuideStar? Your small donation will give many times over to the causes you care about.

Next Steps

Like many nonprofits, there is still a lot for us to learn about measuring and communicating our impact. After all, this was by no means a scientific survey and is only a starting point. Check back here or our main website in the coming months as we do more analysis and post additional impact information.

More stories

I hope you take a look at the examples below and feel proud. These are your sector’s powerful outcomes, and we are incredibly proud to support you in your endeavors. If you took the survey, thank you! We are truly inspired by your work.

GuideStar’s Impact

“In the last year, GuideStar helped me or my organization to….”

Courtesy of Worldreader

Overall

Funding was the largest category in the survey, including 30% of respondents

Median funding amount of $50,000

Move more than $1 billion of funding through the nonprofit sector

Another 15% of respondents used GuideStar to research, benchmark, understand, etc., other nonprofits

Courtesy of Birthright Israel

Nonprofits

Teach 40 students about ethical fundraising at an educational institution in Florida

Prevent 20 instances of incorrect foundation classifications

Prevent or detect fraud or waste 12 times for donors and other interested parties in Asheville, North Carolina

Add 10 GuideStar information links to articles in Wikipedia

Research Form 990s for five running clubs

Courtesy of Solace International

International

Save 10,000 acres of trees in Mesoamerica

Research 30 nonprofits focusing on water in Africa

Teach 52 disadvantaged kids in Johannesburg, South Africa

Research, at no cost, 100 grantmakers funding medical research in the UK

Courtesy of the Gage Academy of Art

The Arts

Deliver 15 cultural shows from India to the populace of greater Houston, Texas

Deliver art supplies to 2,000 patients in New Jersey and Illinois

Restore 3 lighthouses across the country

Courtesy of Loaves and Fishes

Disadvantaged Populations

Feed more than 18 million meals to the disadvantaged

Distribute 160,000 articles of clothing

Touch the lives of 10,000 underserved people in Houston, Texas

Prevent hunger for 3,000 Native Americans in South Dakota

Deliver services to 2,500 survivors of family violence in Tulsa, Oklahoma